that all the time, it could actually come true.'
'Don't be ridiculous, Amelia,' Grandmere said. 'Your father is not going to have to go back to hospital just because
I told a little white lie to an academic administrator.'
'I don't know how you can be so sure of that,' I said, angrily. 'And anyway, where do you think you're taking me? I can't
afford to just be leaving school in the middle of the day, you know, Grandmere. I mean, I've got a lot of catching up to do thanks to the fact that I went to bed so early last night
'Oh, I am sorry,' Grandmere said, very sarcastically. 'I know how much you enjoy your Algebra class. I am sure it is a
very great deprivation to you, missing it today . . .'
I couldn't deny that she was right. At least partially. While I wasn't all that thrilled about the method by which she'd
done it, the fact that Grandmere had extracted me from Algebra wasn't exactly something I was about to cry over.
I mean, come on. Integers are not my best thing.
'Well, wherever we're going,' I said, severely, 'we better be back in time for lunch. Because Michael will wonder where I am.'
'Not that boy again,' Grandmere said, lifting her gaze to the lirno's sun roof with a sigh.
'Yes, that boy," I said. 'That boy I happen to love with all of my heart and soul..."
'Oh, we're here,' Grandmere said, with some relief, as her driver pulled over. 'At last. Get out, Amelia.'
I got out of the limo, then looked around to see where Grandmere had brought me. But all I saw was the big Chanel store
on Fifty-Seventh Street. That couldn't be where we were headed. Could it?
But when Grandmere, untangling Rommel from his Louis Vuitton leash, put him on the ground and then began striding purposefully towards those big glass doors, I saw that Chanel was exactly where we were headed.
'Grandmere,' I cried, rushing after her. 'Chanel? You pulled me out of class to take me shopping?'
'You need a gown,' Grandmere said with a sniff, 'for the black-and-white ball at the Contessa Trevanni's this Friday.
This was the soonest I could get an appointment.'
'Black-and-white ball?' I echoed, as Lars escorted us into the hushed white interior of Chanel, the world's most exclusive fashion boutique - the kind of store that, before I found out I was a princess, I would have been too terrified ever even to
set foot in ... although I can't say the same for my friends, as Lilly had once filmed an entire episode of her cable access show from inside a dressing room at Chanel. She'd barricaded herself in and was trying on Karl Lagerfeld's latest creations, refusing to come out until security broke the door down and escorted her to the sidewalk. It had been a show on how haute couture designers are, judging by the way their clothes fit, really sadistic misogynists at heart. 'What black-and-white ball?'
'Surely your mother told you,' Grandmere said, as a tall, reed-thin woman approached us with cries of, 'Your Royal Highnesses! How delightful to see you.'
'My mother didn't tell me anything about a ball,' I said. 'When did you say it was?'
'Friday night,' Grandmere said to me. To the saleslady she said, 'Yes, I believe you've put aside some gowns for my granddaughter. I specifically requested white ones.' Grandmere blinked owlishly at me. 'You are too young for black.
I don't want to hear any arguing about it.'
Argue about it? How could I argue about something I hadn't even begun to understand?
'Of course,' the saleslady was saying, with a big smile. 'Come with me, won't you, Your Highnesses?'
'Friday night?' I cried, that part, at least, of what was going on beginning to sink in. 'Friday night? Grandmere,
I can't go to any ball on Friday night. I already made plans with—'
But Grandmere just put her hand in the centre of my back and pushed.
And then I was tripping after the saleslady, who didn't even blink an eye, as if princesses in combat boots go tripping
after her all the time.
And now I am sitting in Grandmere's limo on my way back to school, and all I can think about is the number of people
I would like to thank for my current predicament, foremost among which is my mother, for forgetting to tell me that she
already gave Grandmere permission to drag me to this thing; the Contessa Trevanni, for having a black-and-white ball in
the first place; the salespeople at Chanel, who, although they are very nice, are really all just a bunch of enablers, as they
have enabled my grandma to garb me in a white, diamante ball gown and drag me to something I have no desire to attend
in the first place; my father, for setting his mother loose upon the hapless city of Manhattan without anyone to supervise her;
and of course Grandmere herself, for completely ruining my life.
Because when I told her, as the Chanel people were throwing yards of fabric over me, that I cannot possibly attend
Contessa Trevanni's black-and-white ball this Friday night, as that is the night Michael and I are supposed to have our
first date, she responded by giving me a big lecture about how a princess's first duty is to her people. Her heart,
Grandmere says, must always come second.
I tried to explain how this date could not be postponed or rescheduled, as Star Wars would only be showing at the Screen Room that night, and that after that they would go back to showing Moulin Rouge, which I can't see because I heard
someone dies at the end.
But Grandmere refused to see that my date with Michael was anywhere near as important as Contessa Trevanni's black-and-white ball. Apparently Contessa Trevanni is a very socially prominent member of the Monaco royal family,
besides being some kind of distant cousin (who isn't?) of ours. My not attending her black-and-white ball here in the city
with all the other debutantes would be a slight from which the royal house of Renaldo might never recover.
I pointed out that my not attending Star Wars with Michael will be a slight from which my relationship with my boyfriend
might never recover. But Grandmere said only that if Michael really loves me, he'll understand when I have to cancel.
'And if he doesn't,' Grandmere said, exhaling a plume of grey smoke from the Gitanes she was sucking down, 'then he
was never appropriate consort material to begin with.'
Which is very easy for Grandmere to say. She hasn't been in love with Michael since the first grade. She doesn't spend
hours and hours attempting to write poems befitting his greatness. She doesn't know what it is to love, since the only
person Grandmere has ever been in love with in her entire life is herself.
Well, it's true.
And now we are pulling up to the school. It is lunchtime. In a minute I will have to go inside and explain to Michael how I cannot make it to our first date, or it will cause an international incident from which the country over which I will one day
rule may never recover.
Why couldn't Grandmere just have shot me instead?